Update 1.2.0.24 (19 January 2019)

- Changed mechanics of Alp.
- Changed AI to perform better when defending with and against ranged units.
- Changed Black Monolith to always drop the Emperor's Countenance as loot again when destroyed. It's no longer dropped as loot by the Conqueror himself, as players might retreat from battle without realizing that this meant that the armor would be lost forever.
- Fixed some legendary locations potentially getting sucked into nearby combat without the player having to first unlock them properly via event dialog. Requires a new campaign to take effect.
- Fixed game potentially not continuing as characters with equipped wardogs get devoured by a Kraken.
- Fixed Kraken sometimes not dropping loot.
- Fixed issue with necromancer twist of 'Root Out Undead' contract.
- Fixed player strength calculation for scaling purposes not always updating properly.
- Fixed another cause for combat between AI parties on the worldmap potentially not ending.
- Fixed issues with characters retreating without properly taking into account all opponents that can catch up with them, and thus taking improper routes.
- Fixed potential issue with contracts not continuing properly after losing your entire deployed roster in battle, but still having people in reserve to carry on with.
- Fixed various minor issues.

Update v1.2.9 (19 January 2019)

- Various bug fixes that should improve performance and prevent crashes, especially when using fire spells.
- Character customization will now properly allow "None" for Accessory, Mustache, and Beard
- Shops now show the new Tome icons under all circumstances
- The Fictorum should once again receive fall damage, be careful!
- The Fictorum has the proper sound effects based on armor type
- Shaping no longer reduces movement speed
- The impulse from fireball has been lowered a bit
- AI should not improperly gain sight of you
- Healing potions should spawn correctly
- Aiming while channeling should be improved in First Person
- Background Mountains now have LODs
- Familiars will no longer take damage from friendly fire

Patch v1.2.9a notes

- Plasma Ball once again deals damage, whoops!

Patch 7.91 (19 January 2019)

Fixed:
- Spiderwebs, urns and fake beards are a little too dark sometimes.
- Case where Silas’ key can be picked up.
- Achievement for closing all the shutters triggers too early.
- Achievement for disposing of all the spiders triggers too early.
- Couple of typos.
- The windows’ fade planes remain translucent (instead of being black).
- Light leaking in several places.
- Some missing colliders.
- A few plants on the shore change rotation when getting close to them.
- In option menus, you can’t go down with the Dpad when selecting a dropdown menu.
- Rare bug involving a certain magpie and a chest in the Great Hall.
- An asterisk remains visible in the Misc and Keys categories of the inventory when it should not.
- Fixed a rare case of Tilo getting stuck in the lower Great Hall with the elevator up.

Changed:
- Improved performance in many locations (jail, commissary, shore, etc.).
- Rezzia won’t disappear at night if you’re in the middle of the commissary quest.
- Photo mode instructions stay on the screen a little longer before fading away.
- Improved songs’ volume.

Added:
- Added Chinese title art.
- Added new ambient musics to many locations (11 new tracks in total).
- Brand new character theme musics added during dialogs.
- Added focus distance control in photo mode.
- Added new rolling quicksaves system.

SPOILERS
- New cloth items have been added in Silas’ chest as a quest reward.
- New score added to the final battle.

Update 37959 (21 January 2019)

Gameplay Changes and Additions
- Changed balance and AI advantages on Normal, Hard, and Brutal settings. Players may find games on settings above "Easy" to be noticeably harder.
- The AI no longer receives resource bonuses on 'Normal' difficulty mode.
- The player now receives resource bonuses on 'Easy' modes.
- Torpedoes can now be placed in heavy hardpoints.
- Orthin and Gremak can now research Heavy Missiles.
- Strike fighters will now attack starships using beam weapons if their beam weapons are more powerful than their missiles.
- Significantly reduced the range of anti-missiles.
- Reduced marauder ship spawn rates.
- Reduced the strength of Marauder fleets.
- It is now possible to deploy outposts around planets you already control.
- Added several new diplomatic issues.
- Added the 'Expansion Request' event.
- Added the 'Trade War' event.
- Added the 'International Incident' event.
- Added the 'Wreckage Analyzed' event.
- Added the 'Technology Captured' event.
- Reduced the research cost of 'Defense Grid'.
- Increased many agreement influence costs.
- Increased upkeep costs for mid/late game ship hulls.
- Phidi no longer start without the 'Military Doctrine' technology.
- Changed the hiring cost formula of mercenaries; in most cases this is an increase.
- Decreased the spawn rates of mercenaries.
- Increased the cost of the 'Artificial Organisms' tech.
- Increased mid/late game strategic fleet speeds.
- Upgrading tanks no longer increases their build or upkeep costs.
- Increased the number of stars in 'small', 'normal', and 'huge' maps.
- Citizens from allied factions will now sometimes offer to join your empire.
- Allying with an alien faction now removes the "Alien Rulers" morale effect from colonists of their race in your empire.
- Increased the research cost of 'Battle Mechs'.
- Galactic council votes can now influence reputation.
- 'Graviton Physics' and 'Advanced Field Theory' now grant increased tactical speed.
- Increased mid/late game science boosts from experimenting on slaves.
- Reduced the number of technologies offered by the Herald.
- Updated mechanics for ancient data archives.
- Tinkers AIs should now make use of Asteroid Outposts.
- Changes to the random number generator used in planetary bombardment / invasions to improve the accuracy of the predicted outcome display.
- 'Artificial Sentience' now provides +15 science on all worlds instead of +1 improvement slot.
- 'Adaptive Energy Grid' now provides +10 labor on all worlds instead of +1 improvement slot.
- 'Social Engineering' now unlocks a varying number of improvement slots depending on planet size.

AI Changes and Additions
- Various tweaks to the Strategic AI. (Thanks to Harpy Eagle for his contributions.)
- The AI's ship building strategies should now reflect its research strategies, and vice versa.
- A variety of fixes and improvements in the AI's economic logic.
- A variety of fixes and improvements in the tactical combat AI.
- Significant changes to AI behaviors around starting and stopping wars.
- The AI should now be less likely to spam colony ships.
- Adjustments to the AI's handling of planet production changes.
- The AI should now pursue more varied research paths.
- The AI should now sometimes transfer population units between planets.
- AI's will now be more likely to cooperate with allies.
- AI's should now wait at least 15 turns between making peace and restarting a war.
- AI's may now demand that you stop trading with their enemies.
- AI's may now demand that you release their people from slavery.
- AI's may now issue ultimatums before starting a war.
- AI's may now insist that your fleets stay outside their territory.
- AI's may now request to start joint wars against third parties.
- AI's may now demand that you return control of colonies they have a historical claim to.
- AI's may now object if you establish colonies/outposts in their territory.
- AI's may demand control of splinter colonies founded by members of their own species.
- AI's may offer gifts to friendly players.
- Allies should now better cooperate when routing defensive fleets.
- Tweaks to the logic governing AI tactical retreats.
- Changes to the AIs "sue for peace" logic.
- Changes to peace concessions.
- Changes to formula used in resource request events.

UI Changes and Additions
- Added a Victory screen that includes a Graphs screen.
- Added an "Intelligence Briefing" option to the diplomacy screen which will display Graphs for known factions (hotkey Ctrl-G).
- Added a Credits pane to the Main Menu.
- Added various faction-specific weapon art assets.
- Updated the layout scheme for population icons in the planet information screen.
- Added a 'Max Pop' option to the list of sorting criteria in the Planetary Report

Fixes
- Fix for a low level bug in the AI task dispatching logic.
- Added debugger hooks for VS Code.
- Fix for a bug involving intercepted AI transport fleets.
- Fix for a bug involving AI City Planning.
- Fix for a bug in the city planning food consumption logic.
- Fix for a bug caused by absorbing an empire that contained outposts.
- Fix for a star shader glitch affecting many cards using newer AMD drivers.
- Attempted workaround for a bug affecting ship designer part placement.
- Fix for a bug in the AIs handling of captured ships.
- Fix for a bug in the war/peace logic.
- Fix for a bug in the AI improvement selection logic.
- Fix for a bug caused by reverse engineering captured Tinker technologies.
- Fix for a bug involving ignored ship capture reports.
- Transferring control of planets will now also transfer control of all orbiting stations.
- Tinkers should no longer request food aid.
- Fix for a bug caused when one AI empire absorbs another.
- Fix for a bug in the "empire eliminated" report.
- Transfers of planetary ownership should no longer leave invalid "encounter" reports on the starmap.
- Fix for a bug caused when transports arrive at a planet that has changed allegiance.
- Annexing a planet will now reduce its planetary defense level to match what is permitted by your technology.

#### Update 1.2.527.3389 Hotfix (21 January 2010)

* correction of the minor mistakes that were found after the release of the second chapter;
* corrections in localization files;
* added the ability to adjust the autosave frequency (turned off, once every 10 minutes and with each transition between screens).

#### Update 1.0.17.14 (09 January 2019)

* Fixed most instances of blackscreen bugs
* Fixed issues with April not becoming a soulmate